São Paulo State Issues Decree Extending Quarantine Plan to December 16th

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The São Paulo government yesterday issued Decree No. 65,295 in the Federal Gazette, extending quarantine throughout the state until December 16th.

The measure had already been announced on Monday by Governor João Doria after confirmation of the increase in the number of Covid-19 hospitalizations.

Yesterday’s text establishes the possibility of suspending non-essential activities under Decree 64,879, published in March this year.

With this new scenario, the São Paulo Plan, which regulates the stages of quarantine throughout the state, will not be updated this week. Doria has promised a new update for November 30th.

On Monday, Doria said he was “worried” and “cautious” over an observed 18 percent increase in Covid-19 hospitalizations last week.

However, the state government said the data still must be analyzed in combination with new case and death statistics, which are provided by the Ministry of Health and experienced an updating issue in recent days due to a failure in the Federal portfolio’s system.

“The missing data on cases and deaths over six days last week, caused by a glitch in the Ministry of Health’s system, will be solved this week, but has disrupted data normalization across Brazil, here in particular,” said Governor Doria.

In this scenario, the state administration believes in a potential discrepancy in case and death figures in the week preceding the first round of elections, which could imply that the increase in hospitalizations may have been higher because it was compared to a past “good” week with relatively few hospitalizations.

“By the available indicators, most of São Paulo’s regions would be promoted to the green phase. However, ICU bed and hospitalization indicators, under the responsibility of the São Paulo government, grew over the preceding week. The time requires caution for a more complete assessment. Caution and care,” the governor added.

State Health Secretary Jean Gorinchteyn said this week that the majority of those infected are adults of classes A and B, who returned to the streets after the quarantine was relaxed.

Increase of hospitalizations in private hospitals

This week, the Albert Einstein Israeli Hospital in São Paulo alerted to the increase in Covid-19 hospitalizations observed in recent days, in addition to the growth in the number of tests performed and positive diagnoses for the disease.

According to the hospital, between Thursday, November 12th, and Friday, 13th, 18 new hospitalizations related to Covid-19 were recorded, a figure that exceeds the average number of hospitalizations counted daily over the past weeks. “The new figures alert to the need to maintain preventive measures: wearing masks in any environment, indoors or outdoors, respecting social distancing at all times, not engaging in crowds, and frequently sanitizing hands.”

On Thursday, November 12th, the São Paulo government had denied the growth in hospitalizations. But on Monday, the Secretary conceded that there had been an increase in the number of hospitalizations in the private network.

“There is an increase in the number of hospitalizations in some hospitals, such as the [private] Sirio-Lebanês. But at least 45 percent of patients come from outside the state of São Paulo, because the hospitals here are reference centers,” he says.

“I don’t see it as a second wave, I see a sequence of the first. People were isolated, they are back on the streets and many young people are going to parties. When they return, they end up infecting parents and grandparents,” said infectologist David Uip.

What the government claims to do

In a statement, the São Paulo government stated that the new decree extends quarantine for a month, “just as it has been doing since the start of the coronavirus pandemic”.

“As stated in the text, the operation of businesses and services will continue as determined by the São Paulo Plan (Decree 64.994), with no change in classification until November 30th, maintaining the regions of the state in either the yellow or green phases.”

“The São Paulo Plan directs the conscious economic resumption and the population’s daily life, under the premises of safety, prevention, and guaranteed assistance, combined with the encouragement to maintain essential behavior such as sanitizing the hands and home and working environments, as well as the obligatory wearing of masks and, above all, the strengthening of the hospital system.”

Source: UOL